R-Truth reflects on his first meeting with Vince McMahon

R-Truth has had a successful run in both WWE and TNA (now known as Impact Wrestling). For those who might not recall, he was actual under contract with the WWE from 1999–2002 where he had a run as the Hardcore Champion. After finding success in TNA, he signed with the WWE once again in 2008 where he held the United States and Tag Team Titles.

The WWE star recalled his first time meeting the chairman of the company Vince McMahon during a recent appearance on Lilian Garcia’s “Chasing Glory” podcast.

“It was a surreal moment because I was still very green as far as knowing the business, knowing about everything. And then meeting Vince McMahon where he’s telling me that he saw my tape and asked whether I dance and I rap, in which I replied that I did, so he said that he wanted to offer me a contract. It still didn’t dawn on me that I am going to get a real job. I have had one job in my life, my whole life and that was only because of work release to get out of jail so that I wouldn’t see orange anymore. I have never had a job in my life. WWF is my second job in my whole life.”

Before making his main roster debut in 2000 with Road Dogg, he was placed in Memphis Championship Wrestling, a WWE developmental territory at the time.

“At that time, it wasn’t registering to me. It still wasn’t registering to me until I saw those checks. Think about this, back then I was getting checks for probably about 3 to 4 months before they even sent me anywhere. I was at home getting checks and thinking that, okay, at any time they are going to call the cops on me and send me back to jail. I was thinking that it was all just a bit set up because they are sending me all of this money and I hadn’t even done anything yet. I was scared. I remember calling Johnny Ace telling him that I wasn’t sure if they knew that they were paying me because I was sitting at home, but he just laughed and said that you are fine, we are getting things squared away.

I was like, ‘you know that I am cashing these checks and you are sending me all of this money,’ but he assured me that I was fine. But it was like, once I got into developmental it was such a different world. Going from being in the streets and doing everything that the typical thing that guys from the streets do that have no outlook, or have nothing to fall back on or no types of dreams or goals, it was a different life for me. I took a hold of it. I held on and I am still riding it.”